The Mittal Champions Trust is forging ahead to make a difference in Indian sport

Thursday, April 26, 2007

India Shining....

"India Shining" has been the slogan on all our lips for a while now and guess what the words out.... and everyone from different corners of the world are coming here to see if they can get a slice of the pie. I will only talk about the sports world since i am no authority on anything else.The last couple of years has had everyone who is anyone in the sporting world head to India to check out what initiatives we have and how they can get their foot in the door to a country with deep pockets. We had people here from the NBA last year (who obviously didn't do much research because the avg. Indian has a height of 5' 5") so not sure how many Shaq's they were trying to target. Then recently we have had SeppBlatter in town for setting up football ventures. The president of the IOC Jacques Rogge (not sure i got the spelling right) is headed into town for reasons unknown to me but hey they are all coming....Oh how much i would pay to be a little fly on the wall in the plane on their way back to know what they are really thinking....The truth is for all the hype we are not ready for sport as entertainment yet. Yes there is cricket and it is very entertaining but the truth is in the West they used various sports as a platform for various other entertaining activities going on. The game being played is sometimes not even the main focus, I myself have gone to numerous baseball games just to enjoy the hot dogs, peanuts, beer and basic atmosphere of a beautiful ball park. I sometimes couldn't even have told you who won.... and no that is not because of the beer :)So my point is that India has no such infrastructure that the masses can enjoy. Our stadia are dilapidated and so under maintained that even the players don't feel like entering sometimes. So really where are these guys planning to set all these ventures up??? Plus everyone is talking about how the sports industry is the fastest growing industry in the country and lots of management companies are looking to cash in but where are the players???Our own sports minister came out by saying that he didn't want us to get the Asian Games because it would have been a "waste of 5000" crores, well maybe but at least we would have had some nice facilities (I hope) with which we could have molded to having various leagues and using them as entertainment platforms. It might be wishful thinking but at least there was a slim chance of that happening. If he really wanted he could have forced the national associations to set up various leagues and training facilities where the stadia could have been put to use and not just sat there. But hey by the time 2014 rolls around he isn't even going to be sports minister....There were world class facilities built in hyderabad for the National Games in 2002 and they are truly awesome but because of the change in govt and bureaucratic red tape no one is allowed to use them. So here are some of the nicest facilities in the country but because this present chief minister didn't agree with the last chief minister the stadia are all collecting dust. So why are the authorities so hesitant relinquish control and let someone else use them?So the way i see it we are really never going to be able to make any steps in the sports world unless we separate sports with national politics and have people other than politicians running sport. I read a quote some time ago saying how "our country makes most progress at night when the politicians are asleep" and that is pretty accurate even in the sporting world.

2 comments:

Anonymous
said...

Hi Manisha,

Why are you so aggreived with the politicians in the Federations? What are the results of those feds which are not goverened by politicians???????? Could you throw some light? As far as my knowledge goes there are 63 feds registered and recognised by the IOA and getting monetary support fom Sports Ministry (this of course is available on their website) and as I see it from whatever details are available approx 90% are governed by politicians. Some of them do produce international medal winners or have talented sportspersons who can look up to Olympics qualification.... medal that of course is a different piece of cake altogether........So my point is what have the feds not governed by the politicians produced till date? are they any different from the feds which are governed by politicians.The problem area is lack of robust internal competition which will help in identifying the talent and drive people to attain higher glory. My suggestion is that what we need for all of you big donors is to concentrate on building facilities which are world class and generate competition to drive the sports in India. Do an introspection of the money spent on a few of your athletes vis a vis the same amount being spent on development of facilities domestically and then consider how many would have benefitted from such funding and maybe you will find an answer. Create competition in the country first and then maybe the same politicians will rally behined you to supplement your resources...... a win win situation for everyone. Dont look for an Olympic medal in 2008 /12 as you are very very far from it except one odd which may actually not be due to your efforts but.........If you spend the budget of your next four years in developing facilities in india you will probably attain much more than by spending it on selected atheletes...........

We have got to free stadia from the clutches of the governments, be it state or central.

This syndrome of New Delhi not letting the common man access the stadia is crazy. At the same time, a city like Madras (that is what it was called in 1995), where the SAF Games were held 12 years back is a bit different. Other than the shooting ranges, located way out of the city, other infrastructure is being put to use.

Why should Delhi host all big events. Maybe if we are bidding for 2020 Olympics, it should be some other city. Pune, Mr Kalmadi?